Indian Boy Can’t Wear Ponytail To School Youngster Told To Either Braid His Hair Or Cut It Off
To 7-year-old Zakkare Garrett, the dark hair that falls below his shoulders is a proud symbol of his American Indian heritage.
But officials at a public magnet school less than two blocks from his home gave his other a choice: Either have Zakkare cut or braid his hair, or find another school.
“It’s a violation of our religious and cultural rights as Native Americans,” said Zakkare’s mother, Tawnee Webb, who plans to enroll the boy in another school where he can wear his hair in a ponytail.
The dispute is a clash between two trends - the growing renaissance in Indian religion and culture and the movement for school uniforms and other back-to-basics educational reforms.
Phoenix school officials say most parents who choose to send their children to the special magnet schools want uniforms and other restrictions on students’ appearance.
“Mainly they want the kids to look neat, like they did in the old days, as our parents and grandparents would say,” Phoenix School District spokeswoman Sigrid Whitman said.
For many American Indians, however, how they looked in the old days included long hair. Indian students sent to government-run boarding schools, for example, were required to cut their hair as part of their forced assimilation into white society.
“We’ve been told that we’ve got to be saved and this is how you do it - you’ve got to cut your hair and dress like everyone else and if you don’t, you won’t go to heaven,” said Fred Ringlero, a Gila River Indian Community official whose office researches tribal customs.
Telling an Indian boy to cut his hair is something like telling the Pope to wear pants, Ringlero said.
“Our elders told us, ‘You can learn their ways, but always remember who you are. You are not them. Always remember that,”’ Ringlero said.
Like members of many other Indian tribes, Webb’s Pima, Maricopa and Akimel O’odham ancestors traditionally cut their hair only after the death of a loved one.
“It’s a show of mourning,” Webb said. “When someone dies, they cut their hair. When my father dies, that’s when his (Zakkare’s) hair will be cut.”
Webb had wanted her son to attend the Magnet Traditional School because it was already familiar - Zakkare had been getting speech therapy there for more than six months - and she was impressed with the high test scores gained by its students.
The school, one of several with special programs parents can choose in the Phoenix School District, also has strict uniform rules. Students must wear navy blue pants or skirts and white shirts. For girls, makeup, painted nails and teased hair are forbidden. And for boys, “only conventional hairstyles are permitted,” the school’s handbook says.
Webb said school officials first told her Zakkare must cut his hair in order to attend the school, then offered to allow him to braid his hair and either hide it under his collar or pin it up to his head.
“Their compromise didn’t appeal to me, either, because he’s very proud of his hair. He doesn’t really get teased about it,” Webb said.
“It was the mother’s choice not to send the student. He was told to braid his hair, not to cut it,” Whitman said. “We’re not violating any Native American tradition.”